Sunday, 17 June 2012

Arriving in Venice, the journey from airport to city is like no other ...

The water taxi hurtles across the open sea, churning up waves in its wake; in the tilting landscape the city emerges, much the same as it must have looked to arriving travellers arriving by sea centuries ago.

In the Grand Canal the morning traffic is picking up ...

... a honeymoon couple are just up, and taking in the view from their hotel room balcony

Facades lining the Grand Canal all fading, elegant grandeur ...

There's calmer waters in the smaller canals, but it can be a tight squeeze ...

... and will we really fit under these bridges?

These people seem to be wondering the same thing ...

Could this be the most romantic dress shop in the world? I fantasise about working in a place like this, arriving by boat every morning ...

I'm always astonished by the deep blue-green colour of the water in Venice canals - it can't be that clean, so how does it manage to look so beautiful?

Looking up the narrow steep sides now, the buildings are less grand but every one seems a thing of peeling, layered history

and if you crane your neck right up, the rooftops are things of detailed beauty in themselves

Images of gondolas and gondoliers floating down canals are clichés of course ...

... but when we finally arrive at our hotel we find the back views are of a gondola parking-lot

where it's time for a gondoliers' morning tea-break and a bit of a chin-wag in the sun ...

Buongiorno, Venezia ... now it's time to unpack and explore.

Photos taken early this month, on a jubilee weekend escape; more to follow.